According to Japanese media reports, Shin-Etsu Chemical, a Japanese silicon wafer manufacturer, recently announced an announcement to increase the sales price of all its silicon wafer products by 10% to 20% from April.
Shin-Etsu Chemical said in the announcement that the price increase is due to the increase in the cost of the main raw material silicon metal, as well as the strong growth of demand in the Chinese market, which has led to supply shortages and rising production costs. In addition, tight supply has increased the cost of methanol and metallic platinum as raw materials for catalysts. In addition to these, logistics costs and secondary material costs have continued to rise. These factors have put pressure on revenue.
The company emphasized that it is difficult to absorb these increasing costs through its own efforts to reduce manufacturing costs, so it has to increase the price of all silicon wafer products.
As of September 2020, Shin-Etsu Chemical has a market share of 29.4% in the global silicon wafer product market, ranking first in the world.
